Blame Read Online Free PDF Page B

has ever managed to make her feel better and now it doesn’t matter anymore. Or maybe it does? Would a therapist help her explain what had happened? Would a therapist understand it?
    Right now, Anna can think of nothing to say to a therapist, or for a therapist to say to her. There are some things that cannot be reasoned with, some events that cannot be reframed so as to be more acceptable, and no positive thinking that would bring Maya back, so what would the point of a therapist be?
    ‘You need to talk to someone,’ Keith, her mother, her mother-in-law and her sisters-in-law have all said to her.
    ‘You’re one to talk,’ Anna had said to her mother when she suggested seeing someone.
    ‘I’m only trying to help, Anna,’ Vivian had said, a wounded look crossing her face as she became aware other people were listening. Her mother was always particularly self-conscious in front of Keith’s mother and his sisters, knowing that Anna often turned to one of them first when she needed someone to talk to. ‘Keith’s mother says . . .’ Anna would quote when speaking to her own mother.
    ‘So you’ve already spoken to her,’ an aggrieved Vivian would say.
    ‘Of course I have,’ she would reply. It is, Anna knows,an unnecessary and unkind thing to do but she had never been able to stop herself from doing it.
    ‘I’ll think about it,’ she had said to her mother-in-law, because there was never a reason to be rude to Keith’s mother.
    ‘I have nothing to say,’ Anna has told Keith because that, in the end, is how she feels. She has nothing to say and she would prefer to have nothing to think either.
    Cynthia has left behind her a light smell of musk perfume and, without filtering the comment, Anna says to Walt: ‘She’s pretty. Is she your girlfriend?’ It was his coffee order that had alerted her—there was no please or thank you, just an assumption that the other detective would be happy to get him coffee and would also know exactly how he liked it. It might be because they are work partners but Anna senses something else. She can remember the thrill of knowing exactly how Keith liked his coffee, of feeling like she knew him better than anyone did. Now, she can’t remember the last time she’d actually made Keith a cup of coffee.
    ‘Um . . .’ says Detective Anderson and the tips of his ears colour a little. He goes from man to boy in an instant, and Anna feels a streak of jealousy towards the lovely Cynthia. ‘Who are you?’ she thinks. She doesn’t know where her thoughts are coming from anymore. Maya, and everything to do with Maya, took up most of her conscious thoughts, and it feels like now she’s not here Anna’s brain is in some sort of freefall. She finds herself biting her lip a lot to prevent herself saying awful things.
    ‘I can’t believe I just asked you that,’ she says. ‘It was very inappropriate, I’m sorry. I feel like I’ve said that word a million times in the last two weeks. I keep apologising.’
    ‘It’s all right, Anna. It’s been a difficult time; a really difficult time. You don’t have to keep apologising,’ says the detective, but he doesn’t look at her.
    ‘I feel like I should. You were so nice the night of the accident. I remember that, you know. Even though I don’t remember much, I remember how lovely you were. You were so patient with Keith. I wanted to smack him.’ Anna bites her lip even though the words are already out. ‘Oops,’ she thinks.
    Walt doesn’t say anything. He looks up from the camera and focuses his gaze on her, and she feels more stupid words trip off her tongue. ‘I shouldn’t have said that but I did want to give him a slap. He was so . . . so . . . so Keith, really. I suppose it was a reaction to what had happened, but when he was sitting next to me and just wailing like a child, I wanted to hit him. “Why has this happened? Why has this happened?” he kept saying; do you remember that?’
    ‘Yes, Anna. I do